A Brief Glance
by SidQuin
Summary: A small look into the lives of various characters.


Just a Brief Glance

Summary: Short drabbles about various Slam Dunk characters. Mild references to other shows and celebrities.

* * *

><p><strong>Touch the Sky<strong>

Young Haruko's first memory is not of a nurturing mother, a doting father, or even a beloved childhood toy. It's of the wind through her hair and a vast blue sky that suddenly seems just a little closer as her only slightly-older brother clumsily attempts to give her a piggyback ride.

**Ambiguity**

If anyone ever asked how the friendly and good-natured Jin managed to befriend the impossibly quiet and stand offish Fukuda, Jin would smile and say they bonded over being the tallest kids in their neighborhood. Fukuda would simply not respond and maybe look awkwardly off to the side, but since he does that often anyways, no one ever thinks much of it.

The truth is that for the longest time Fukuda thought Jin was a cute girl.

**You Look Familiar...**

"Well that was a waste time," sighed the 14-year-old Mito Yohei as he stepped over yet another unconscious street punk. "I wonder who Urameshi and Kuwabara are…"

His companion, an excessively tall redhead with a pompadour, only huffed, "I don't know, but I'm tired of being mistaken for them."

**Unintentionally Interesting**

Starting in his 2nd year of middle school, Sawakita had a part-time English tutor. It wasn't that his grades for English were especially bad - well okay, maybe they were - but because he knew his passion for basketball would eventually take him to the States. More important than conjugating a verb into past present form on a test, he knew his pronunciation and listening skills needed some serious work, something his thickly accented Japanese English teachers weren't helping with.

And so during the summer of his 9th grade year his father hired an international college student to help him get used to hearing and speaking in English. He supposed she was nice enough, a trendy American girl whose race he could never figure out other than that she was not-Asian. However, as her interests lied more in celebrities and pop culture then basketball, the two never really bonded. At least until one day…

"Hey you shaved your head," she smiled, reaching a hand out to pet his new haircut.

"Yeah, the high school I got into is pretty strict about haircuts," Sawakita replied, thinking of how all the boys at Sannoh were either bald or close to it.

"Must be a pretty elite school then. Congrats," she said in English before adding, "Drake."

She was met with a blank look from her student, "What's a Drake?"

Grinning, she explained, "It's a name. With your new haircut you look like a Drake. It comes from the Latin word "Draco" which means dragon." She could practically see the awe in his eyes.

"Drake… I like it." Giving a small smile, Sawakita took a moment to memorize the foreign word. Smirking playfully, the tutor decided not to mention that Drake was also the name of a rapper who just happened to have that same hairstyle…

**Puberty and the Weeping Willow**

While centers like Takenori Akagi or Toru Hanagata were pretty much giants from birth, Jun Uozumi, the tallest of them all, actually spent his grade school years as a fairly normal sized child. Needless to say, the sudden transition from innocent boyhood into awkward, pimply faced adolescence really isn't helped when you're also a gangly, two meter tall giant whose constantly tripping over his own two feet. The weird old dude who follows you around and obsessively tries to recruit you into high school basketball doesn't help much either.

**Don't You Dare Say The Fucking "H" Word**

When Hanagata first got his glasses, Fujima would not stop teasing him. Perhaps it was for that _one_ time Hanagata accidentally mistook him for a girl (he had poor eye sight, okay?), but this hazing was getting pretty ridiculous. Why, oh why did his mother think square lenses with thick black frames was a good idea? But the last straw, however, is when even the quietest member of their team joins in.

"I'm telling you guys, I can't stand ANY kind of seafood," Hanagata explains as they drag him to a sushi bar.

"Who ever heard of a Japanese person who doesn't eat fish?" Fujima prods, shooting his friend a condescending smirk.

Glaring back irritably, the center adds, "Fish is disgusting, it's just too-"

"Mainstream?" Interjects a certain spiky haired shooting guard.

There's a silence as it sinks in that even _Hasegawa_'s mocking him. A moment later, Fujima's doubled over laughing.

"Oh, fuck you both," Snaps Hanagata as he flips them both the bird.

**Get Yo Hurr Did**

Ryota Miyagi is generally a very self-assured person. You can't be 168 centimeters tall and manage to succeed at high school basketball without an impressive level of self-confidence. So when people call him a midget, or a punk, or Bruno Mars, he can generally brush it off, if not _physically_ correct these naysayers.

That said, wearing a pink shawl is a blow to anyone's masculinity, even his, "…This isn't exactly what I had in mind when you asked me to come with you." In the barber's seat next to him sat his beloved "Aya-chan", also equipped with a pink hair shawl.

"Well we both have perms and our roots had to grow out eventually," Ayako informed as she gestured to the straight hair on the crown of her head, "and there was a two-for-one deal."

Ryota, however, was too busy fidgeting under the hands of his all-too-happy male hairstylist to listen, "Isn't getting your hair done something women usually do with their _girl_friends?" Ayako only snickered.

**Out of the Mouth of Babes**

Tsuyoshi Kishimoto is generally not a man to be tried with. From his curly, unkempt ponytail, to the studs that adorned his ears, to his towering stature, Kishimoto looked every bit as thuggish off the court as he was on it. Not that he minded much; it was a fairly accurate representation of who he was as a person, rough and uncaring of what others thought. Of course, if you asked a certain Shohoku forward, he would've told you the long hair and pierced ears just made the him look like a really tall, really ugly girl. But that little upstart had bright red Dennis Rodman hair, so it's not like his opinion mattered.

"The train's awfully roomy today," commented Minami as he observed the all the empty seats next to them despite how packed the train usually was at that hour.

"You get used to it," Kishimoto smirked as he sent a nearby high schooler a death glare, causing the poor student to back away even further. Before Kishimoto could revel in the moment, however, the train stopped and a little girl and her mother got on board.

While the mother, like everyone else, chose to stay standing rather than sit next to a couple of hooligans, her daughter quickly let go of her hand and took a seat next to Kishimoto. While he was slightly perturbed by the carelessness of the mother, he figured he could ignore the little nuisance till the next stop.

Not content to just sit next to a delinquent high schooler, however, the little girl spoke up, "You have pretty hair lady. Can I touch it?"

Before Kishimoto could even process what happened, _Minami -o_f all people- burst into a fit of snickers that quickly erupted into laughter as even a few of the scared high schoolers from before joinedin. Ever tempted to beat the living daylights out of his captain, Kishimoto instead resolved to get a haircut after practice.

* * *

><p>Author's Note: Hey, those things you wrap around people when you give them a haircut are called shawls right?<p>

Inspirations...

*There are a bunch of tumblr posts comparing Miyagi to Bruno Mars and one that observed how hipster Hanagata's fashion sense is. Also, Fujima's a bitch to characterize. All we really know about him is that he's really close with his team, super competitive, and sees nothing wrong with grabbing his friend's butts in public.

*I've always thought Ayako and Miyagi had a similar look going on, what with the curly brown hair and arched eyebrows.

*There's an NBA2k11 mod of Sawakita where I swear he looks just like Drake and now I just can't unsee the resemblance. As for his tutor, her name's Mary (nickname: Marin-Sensei), a Brazillian-American girl of African-Portugese-Japanese descent. She's the outgoing, fashionable type.

*Mito and Sakuragi's resemblance to Yusuke and Kuwarabara has always amuses me.

*Is it weird that I think Kishimoto's good looking? Personality-wise, I've always preferred him to Minami.

*It's always kinda disturbed me how Jin has the body of an athlete but the face of a cute little girl. Also Fukuda is so ugly-cute it hurts. He's like a pug!

*And speaking of ugly-cute, 1st year Uozumi always make me laugh. You can kinda tell he was one of those kids that puberty was not kind to, so he just comes off as awkwardly lanky rather then intimidating. And the Fujima-do really doesn't suit his face. He's not like Akagi whose always been excessively manly. Also, Big Jun is a ridiculously cute nickname.

*While she's not my favorite character, I still think it's unfair how little attention Haruko gets, especially outside the context of romantic interest. I've always been interested in her relationship with her brother, he seems to have been a strong influence in her life. And the mental image of a little Gori trying to carry around his only slightly younger sister was way too cute to pass up, so it's my favorite of the batch.


End file.
